lei xau-dja-sei

[And Rosta <a.rosta@UCLAN.AC.UK>]

Replying to suggestions from Jorge (who's already
replied to Mark V) and Chris

> > 1a The people each read **a different** book.

kb> le prenu pa'a tcidu le cukta
kb> (The cmaste happens to use this very example; look under pa'aku.
kb> It means "respectively")

I don't have an up to date ma'oste with this in. And I'm
rather irked to find that my time away from Lojban has led
me to forget how to construe BAI before selbri [O hurry up
codical refgrammar!]. But even so, I find your report pretty
mystifying: I can't see how it would work. Could you explain
a bit more?

xj>        le prenu cu tcidu lo frica cukta
xj> No problem here, because the scope of "lo" is within that
xj> of "le". You cannot however rephrase as:
xj>        lo frica cukta cu se tcidu le prenu
xj> which does not mean: A different book is read by each
xj> of the people. It rather means that there is at least
xj> one "different book" read by all.

Your version means "book having something to do with differers".
I want "each person read a book not read by the others".

> > 1b the couple who are respectively french and german

kb> le remei be fi le dotco jo'u le fraso
kb> (BTW the cmaste is in error -- it's definition of remei is not kb>
consistent with it's definition of mei, or the definition in the kb>
mex paper)

Not fa'u?

How does your version yield the required meaning?

kb> I would think it would be OK to say "le dotco je fraso remei" to
kb> be short but imprecise.

I'm looking for something precise, and ideally short.

xj>        le remei poi ge pa ke'a fraso gi pa ke'a dotco
xj> The slight difference is that the Lojban here allows for one
xj> member being franco-german and nothing is said of the other,
xj> but I think pragmatics should take care of that.

Is "pa ke'a" legit? What does it mean? Something like "one member of
which"? Anyway, I'm seeking something corresponding to exactly what I
was after.

> > 2a the mothers of Xorxe and And

kb> le mamta be la xorxes .e la .and
kb> (If you had the same mother, you'd have to say
kb> le mamta be la xorxes jo'u la .and, I think.)

I;m pretty sure that's not right. Your version makes me & Xorxe
brothers.

xj to kb:
> I think that has to be a mother of both. It does not expand to
> le mamta be la xorxes ku e le mamta be la and. Didn't we
> talk about this some time ago? I'm feeling all dejavuish.

We did. But I can't remember the upshot, and whatever the upshot
was, I doubt it is what I'm now looking for, because I've only
just started thinking about examples like these.

xj>        le mamta be la xorxes a la and
xj> i.e. Each of those that are either mother of Xorxe or mother of
And xj> (or both). Notice that this does _not_ expand to: xj>
le mamta be la xorxes ku a le mamta be la and

But it does expand to

           le ga mamta be la xorxes gi mamta be la and

- this would work for "ro mamta be la xorxes a la and" but not
for "lo mamta be la xorxes a la and", which could refer to just
your mum.

> > 2b the mothers of the men

kb> le pa'a mamta be le nanmu

Can you explain this too to me, please?

xj>        lei mamta be lei nanmu
xj> If you don't want to use lei you can say:
xj>        le mamta be su'o le nanmu
xj>        Each of those that are a mother of at least one of the men.
xj> I think that the proper scope here is as in: xj>        ro da poi
su'o de poi nanmu zo'u ke'a mamta de

Okay, "le mamta be su'o le nanmu" is good. Let's change the
example to:

3a   the sisters of the men   [each of the men have sisters who are
                               being referred to] (same as 2c)
3b   the mothers of some men

> 2c the children of the women

xj>        lei panzi be lei ninmu
xj> or:
xj>        le panzi be su'o le ninmu
xj>        Each of those that are a child of at least one of the
women.

The latter is better, but how to get the meaning where each of the
women has children? (Same goes for "children of xorxes and and".)

> > 2d The french and germans [not only people with dual nationality]

kb> loi fraso joi loi dotco
xj>        le fraso e le dotco
xj>        lei fraso ku joi lei dotco

OK, but not enough of a solution for me. Change example to:

3c we are french and german [but not necessarily dual nationality]

xj> > I can only manage them with long circumlocutions. Are there some
xj> > tricks I'm missing? > Tricks indeed they are. I don't think
there is a standard easy way > to respectivize.

The examples in 1 are respectives. The examples in 2 are different.
3a, for example, is "each member of set s1 such that for each x that
is member of s1, there is a y that is member of set s2, and for each z
that is member of s2, there is a w that is member of s1, and x is
sister of y and w is sister of z". You can say that in Lojban,
(anything expressible in simple predicate logic is expressible in
lojban) but it's a bit of a mouthful, and I thought someone, whose
name would probably be something like "John Cowan", might have cooked
up a shorthand method - it is, after all, a fairly frequent kind of
reading.

ki'e markl, xorxes, kris
i'o sono vostro pendo and